May 03, 2007

Legislative Update #9

Florida Greyhound Association

(Tuesday, May 8, 2007)

 

From: FGA President Phil Ruotolo

 

By: Alisa Snow and Lena Juarez

 

The Senate was quiet this week on pari-mutuel and VLT Legislation so we worked in the House with Jack Cory.

 

 

A News article about this week is listed below.


From the St. Petersburg Times blog, May 03, 2007

Video lottery dead

Cancel that planned weekend playing the video lottery terminals at Derby Lane. After a series of chaotic floor votes Wednesday, gambling lobbyists have thrown in the towel, and say there won't be a vote on legalizing VLTs at 10 or more pari mutuel facilities. The death knell came when Rep. David Rivera's fellow Republicans voted against an innocuous amendment to a lottery bill that was to have carried the video lottery language. That vote reflected a high level of anti-gambling sentiment in Marco Rubio's House.


In the Florida House this week by Jack Cory:

SB1376 would allow the Department of Lottery to create and trademark/patent new games with its name and logo.  The bill sailed through the Senate on April 27 but it needed House approval before it could go to the governor to become law.

The House companion Bill, HB 1551 had not been heard in the Council on Government Efficiency & Accountability Chaired by Rep. Andy Gardiner R-Orlando.  Rep. Gardiner opposed the Bill.

The House sponsor, Rep. David Rivera (R-Miami) the Chairman of the Rules and Calendar Council, had the bill moved form the Government Efficiency & Accountability Council to the Environmental & Natural Resources Council and placed on a Special Council Agenda for Monday April 30th at noon. 

Rep. Mary Brandenburg (D-Lake Worth), Rep. Richard Macheck (D-Delray), Rep. Rich Glorioso (R-Plant City) and others sponsored your amendment for “Equal Treatment under the Law” for all Pari-Mutuels which would include purse enhancement and purse protection for you. 

The sponsor asked us to withdraw the amendment and promised to work with us before the bill got to the Floor. This is a normal procedure.

We tried to work with the Tracks on Tuesday on a compromise. They offered contract negotiation but with the local associations, not the FGA.  I consulted with Phil and many of you and was told that that was not acceptable. 

I informed the Tracks but they did not come back with a counter offer.  Instead they began telling the Legislative Members that we were being unreasonable because, I guess, we did not do it their way.

They continued to work late into the night on Tuesday and finally told the sponsor and some other Legislative Leaders that they had 64 Members of the House committed to vote for the Lottery Bill with the VLT amendment but without Purse protection for you.

So on Wednesday morning, day 58 of the Legislative Session, I contacted Phil and it was decided that we could not wait any longer for the Tracks to compromise. Therefore it was decided that we should oppose any bill that had a VLT amendment that did not have purse enhancement and purse protection for you. 

 The sponsor of the Lottery Bill and the Greyhound Tracks saw fit to try to amend SB 1376 which emerged as the only bill for the tracks to use for their VLT language.

SB 1376 was the first bill on the Special Order Calendar for Wednesday (May 3).  I anticipated the tracks to try to get the bad VLT amendment on this bill and send it to the Senate. 

Rep. Thad Altman (R- Melbourne), Rep. Ron Reagan (R-Sarasota), Rep. Charlie Dean (R-Inverness) and Rep. Joyce Cusack (D-Deland) filed your Equal Treatment under the Law for all pari-mutuels amendment.

If you are in the District of any of these Legislative Members please call AND write a thank you note to them for trying to help you!!

Since no one offered the VLT amendment, our amendment was withdrawn.

The House sponsor of the Lottery Bill then offered two other amendments. Each amendment was written slightly differently, to give enforcement rights to the Department of Lottery. We believe this was an attempt to bounce the Bill; in another word send it back to the Senate, so that the Senate could put the bad VLT amendment on it and send it back to the House very late in the Session.  

The first amendment died on a 57-57 tie vote and the second one, after much debate, was killed overwhelmingly by a 48-69 vote. The sponsor of the bill then asked that the bill be temporally postponed.

The tracks’ lobbyists spent the rest of the week trying to revive the issue and convince House members to reconsider their votes. They discussed several approaches – expanding the amendment so that VLTs would be put in all tracks, not just those in large counties. There was also an attempt to give Hialeah Horse Track the ability to reactivate its pari-mutuel license.

In the end, between the anti-gambling sentiment in the House and the disgust with the process the Track Lobbyists were employing had grown to the point that members of the House didn’t want to discuss the issue any longer.

The Department of Lottery Bill was one of the last pieces of legislation voted on, but it did not have the Florida Greyhound Tracks BAD VLT language.

The FGA/NGA will continue to seek legislation on behalf of ALL Florida and National Breeders, Owners and Kennel Operators that will protect your purses in the Florida Statue.